In this century, all our actions and movements are related to alg a type of electronic device, from our computer to our cell phone helps us facilitate our daily life but we all know which is really the operation of these devices? What moves them? What is your heart?. If gentlemen all these devices have a heart or could also call csr brain, and is the microprocessor, that piece of silicon has led us to have a quality of life unimaginable. Before squarely the issue of microprocessors we must first know your definition and history, now we understand microprocessor:
The microprocessor, micro or central processing unit, CPU, a chip which serves as the brain of the computer. Within this electronic component exists n million transistors integrated.
usually have a flat prism, and are installed on an element called socket. Also, older models used welded directly to the motherboard. Appeared some models where the format was adopted cartridge, but not very successful. Currently there is a special socket to hold the microprocessor and the cooling system, which often is a fan (cooler). The microprocessor comprises: records, the control unit and arithmetic / logic unit.
MICROPROCESSOR HISTORY
In view of the complexity, the Intel engineer Ted Hoff had the idea of \u200b\u200bdesigning a generic processor, whose behavior was governed by a sequence of instructions loadable externally. In this way, could alter the actual behavior of the chip, but without having to redesign the silicon real task expensive and slow.
So finally, in November 1971 saw the light, the first microprocessor undermined denominated I nte l 4004. It was a silicon device consisting of some 2,300 transistors and operated at a frequency of 108 KHz. The cost of each chip Intel 4004 was about $ 200 at the time. Since it was a custom, Intel had paid Busicom a figure close to 60,000 dol ares for development. But being able to see the potential of development, Intel offered to refund the amount, and Busicom was delighted, as the costly development and left him free. Intel was all a great investment that has been leveraged over its 30 year history. And that has made the semiconductor manufacturer in a major global companies.
Due to its small size, the device was labeled as a microprocessor, to differentiate it from the process to equip the large computers of the era.
CURRENT AND THE CELL PROCESSOR
This era is marked by chip size reduction and capacity maximization data processing, we are in an era where processors operate at a speed of up to 3.8 Ghz (P4) and until we have processed beef dual core such as Intel's CoreDuo.
The Superprocesador Cell consists of a core 64-bit general purpose (PowerPC) connected to 8 special purpose cores called SPU. In other words, the Cell processor will work as a network of neurons, the magic is that this process Sadore, is able to use broadband connectivity for ultra high speed processor to interoperate with other like if they were a great system. Unlike SMP systems or multi-core chips (multi-core), only the general purpose PowerPC core is capable of running a generic operating system, while the SPUs are specialized to run computational tasks. Now let some of its technical features: - The first model has a top speed of 4 GHz. Specific model In his first round speed of 4.6 Ghz.
- has the ability to make 256 trillion calculations every second bone 256 Gigaflops.
- is composed of 234 million transistors.
- Manufacture in 90 nm (nanometers).
- Operation to 85 ยบ C heat sink.
- Operating Voltage of 1.3 Volts.
- Arquictetura Multi-Core.
Now for the cell processor architecture in the following image:
recently have experimented with Cell processors to show that you use outside consoles PS3, but 
in 2-specific utilization of these processors work do to 2.4-2.6GHz, two chips 512Mb XDR DRAM and 2 South Bridge LSIs running a system Linux OS v.2.6.11.
Now for a little commercial developed by Sony promoting the new processor for the PS3, which talk about the capabilities of data processing simultaneously:
Xenon Vs Cell
Let some comparisons between contricante processor closest to the cell processor, the processor Xenon heart of the Xbox 360 console see:
Cell processor (PS3)
- runs at a speed 4 Ghz
- 234 million transistors.
- 2.5 megabyte memory chip RAMBUS
- Contains 8 SPUs (Core)
- based Core 64-bit Power
Xenon Processor (Xbox 360)
- runs at a speed of 3.2 Ghz
- 165 million transistors
- 1 MB Level 2 cache
- has 3 core multithreaded
- Version modification of a 64-bit PowerPC core.
As shown the two chips are developed for a high performance compute-intensive tasks in the multimedia area which cover the sectors of video games, movies and other forms of digital content.
For these features, the Cell microprocessor is known as the supercomputer on a chip. However, as a differentiator from the rest of the chips, Cell is built with individual microcells working independently. Thus, if multiple computers linked in a network, the chip can borrow part of the computing power that you're not using a computer to another. The best example is the case with the PlayStation 3. If we connect to the Internet, one can use part of the Cell chip to complement the other tasks that require heavy use of poder.En summary, Cell is a semiconductor composed of several processors that work together to manage multiple tasks at the same time. The idea is that, in future, all forms of digital content come together and are based on the broadband network.
Ram Memory
As for memory, 256MB of XDR mount PS3 as the main memory at 3.2 GHz and another 256 MB of GDDR VRAM (video memory) to 700 MHz .
